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S2E19 – The Walk Around Test

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You should be doing the Walk Around Test before you release your music..

The Walk Around Test by GratuiTous
LOL.. maybe not like this..

To Be a Little More Cereal.. (Serious)

The Walk Around Test is something that I have done for many years before releasing my music publicly.

It’s that FINAL LISTEN after you’ve made the beat, done your arrangement, and applied your AUDIO PAINTING.

It’s listening to make sure that the song FLOWS.

You press play from the beginning of the song, and listen from the listener’s perspective if anything stands out in a weird way.. like does an instrument come in abruptly?

If so.. what can you do to help smoothen the transition of adding or removing that instrument?

There are various Audio Painting Tools you can use like a snare roll, a reverse cymbal, or EVEN SILENCE is powerful, too!

Closing Out..

The Walk Around Test will help you have a clear outlook on your track.

It’s looking at the song AFTER everything is done. Once you think the song is 100% complete, press play, and listen for anything that stands out to you in a bad way.

Go and make your MINOR ADJUSTMENTS, and you will be perfecting your song for the world.

That is the Walk Around Test.. I hope it helps you out 😎

Bonus..

Here’s the RECOGNIZED FL STUDIO TRAINER video I was talking about.. learn more here:

Read the Recognized FL Studio Trainer post!
5 Keys Book Audio Painting Mixing Walk Around Test

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Transcript

S2E19 – The Walk Around Test

  1. Season two, episode 19, the walk around test.
  2. Now, this is a really cool tip that I have picked up over the years, and it just
  3. allows me to double check my mix, make sure I like all the audio painting, right?
  4. I talked to you guys about audio painting.
  5. I wrote a book on this. You guys can check it on Amazon or just visit my website
  6. underneath the books tab. It's called audio painting.
  7. and so the walk around test is essentially just giving one last listen from
  8. beginning to end. If anything stands out that you don't like, you get up,
  9. you fix it, and then you go back and sit somewhere and just relax for a bit and you
  10. listen to it. Okay, I'm gonna break it down further in this episode.
  11. So this is actually something that I talk about in my free book, my five keys to a
  12. successful beat book. It is key number five, truthful listening environment, the
  13. walk around test. Okay, if you want to get the free book, again it's called Five
  14. Keys to a Successful Beat. You can go to it's gratuitous.com forward slash five
  15. keys, or just check the episode's description to visit the link.
  16. Now, before we get into the episode, a couple things I want to update you guys on is
  17. I released a new course. All right, I finally got back into releasing a course.
  18. This one is called Windows Shortcuts for music producers.
  19. So it is for Windows users, and it's going to show you a bunch of keyboard tricks,
  20. keyboard shortcuts as you're using Windows to speed you up.
  21. It's gonna help you a lot. All right.
  22. Again, if you are a part of the membership, you get the course automatically.
  23. or you can purchase the course individually.
  24. So head on over to it's gratuitous.com, visit the shop.
  25. Also, I'm working on another course.
  26. It is about recording your voice with no latency.
  27. All right. So latency is a really annoying thing in the audio industry.
  28. Computers aren't powerful enough to be able to record your voice with no latency.
  29. We can get quite low latency, but what I tell you in that course. is I I give you
  30. three different ways that you can record quite well with your voice
  31. Okay, so be on the lookout for the recording your vocals with no latency course that
  32. will be coming soon if everything went well.
  33. and Windows Shortcuts for music producers is now released, so you guys can purchase
  34. it by itself or just join the membership and you can check out all the courses.
  35. Just go to it's gratuitous.com.
  36. Okay. All right, so I want to talk to you about the walk around test, and I'm pretty
  37. sure I talked to you about this in another episode.
  38. I just couldn't find it. But so the walk around test is when you think the
  39. beat is done, okay? So when we make a beat, it goes through different stages.
  40. We actually make the beat, whether you are starting with the drum loop first or with
  41. your melodies first. It's up to you.
  42. There's no right or wrong way.
  43. Sometimes if you make the drum loop first, you can kind of get a different beat.
  44. And then if you start with your melodies first, sometimes you make a bit of a
  45. different beat as well. All right.
  46. So it's up to you. And in my opinion, I would say mix it up.
  47. That way you don't get stuck and you keep having fun.
  48. So once the beat is kind of made, I usually work towards a chorus, all right.
  49. I usually try to get my drum loop made, my melodies made, and I try to think, is
  50. this beat complete as a chorus?
  51. Once it's complete as a chorus, it's easy to start breaking it apart, right?
  52. You have all your individual instruments, and now you as you want to, you know,
  53. create your verse, your pre-chorse, your bridge, right?
  54. Your verse two. Now you have all the different instruments that you can add and
  55. remove. And so that's like the arrangement stage, okay.
  56. Once the arrangement stage is done, I then will listen to that beat again, and I'll
  57. just listen for when that chorus comes in.
  58. Does it feel like a chorus?? Do I need to add more instruments
  59. And if I don't, then I go on to what's called the audio painting stage.
  60. Again, I've written a book on audio painting.
  61. You can visit my website, just click the books tab, you'll see audio painting.
  62. It's also available on Amazon.
  63. And so audio painting is all about listening from the listener's perspective, okay?
  64. Because when you've made the beat, like you have listened to this beat over and over
  65. and over. So you know it in and out.
  66. But when someone listens to the beat for the first time or the second or third time,
  67. it's like you're essentially taking them on a roller coaster ride, right?
  68. You are essentially controlling their emotions, and audio painting is adding in our
  69. transitions or removing instruments at certain parts to build tension and
  70. really add emotion throughout the track.
  71. So the beats made, we've arranged our track, we've done some audio painting to
  72. prepare the listener. Now, this is where the walk around test comes in because now
  73. essentially the track is almost done.
  74. Like, you know, you think the track is done.
  75. And so what I would usually do is I'd go all the way to the beginning of the song, I
  76. would hit play, and I would allow the song to play from beginning to end.
  77. If I feel that I have to change anything, I mean, let's say the piano is a little
  78. bit too loud. Okay, I'll stop, I'll fix the piano, and usually I'll go right back to
  79. the beginning of the beat, hit play again.
  80. If that's a little bit too tedious for you, you can just kind of play where you left
  81. off and just let it keep going.
  82. But I will try to listen to the full beat, and if I can listen to it from beginning
  83. to end without noticing that the arrangement feels weird, or if something's too
  84. loud, or if something's out of place, if I can listen to it from beginning to end
  85. and think, yeah, I'm happy, then that satisfies the walk around test.
  86. And again, this is just something that I've done for years.,
  87. Now the reason I call it the walk around test is usually I would hit play and I
  88. would go and do other things, like such as like maybe organizing some papers or just
  89. organizing things. over time I would go and just hit play, and I would go and pet my
  90. dog before he passed away. So I'd pet my dog, as soon as I would hear something in
  91. the track, I'd get up, I'd fix it, and I'd go back to my dog and pet him.
  92. And every single time I'd stand up, he'd always kind of get up and be like, Hey,
  93. where are you going? And then I'd fix whatever it was, and you know, he's he's there
  94. thinking, like hoping I don't take too long, you know.
  95. Hit play, and then again, I'll go back, pet my dog, and I would wait until you know,
  96. can I hear anything? Does anything stand out in a way that I don't like?
  97. And essentially that's the walk around test, okay?
  98. So again, there's different stages of the production process.
  99. And once it passes the beat making stage, once it passes the arrangement stage, once
  100. it passes the audio painting stage, then that's where I do this walk around test.
  101. If I can listen to the track from beginning to end, and again, what I'm looking for
  102. is when it hits that chorus, does the chorus sound full?
  103. If the chorus sounds good, I'm also listening for when you're listening to the
  104. arrangement. Does it sound weird when it builds up to the chorus, or does it sound
  105. weird when it switches from the chorus to the verse?
  106. Now, in the verse, does the verse sound boring?
  107. Like, do you have to add another instrument in?
  108. And in order to add another instrument in, we need to do some audio painting, such
  109. as like a reverse symbol or like a snare roll, or even just a snare hit with tons of
  110. reverb, right? We need to transition to add our instruments to add them in, or even
  111. remove instruments. Otherwise, our music sounds amateur.
  112. And that's what audio painting is.
  113. Okay. So that's what I'm listening for as I'm listening to the track.
  114. Is it flow? Because again, I'm telling you guys. that audio painting is all about
  115. preparing the listener It's essentially that when they put your song on, they hit
  116. play, you're taking them on a roller coaster ride.
  117. When it goes up to that chorus, right?
  118. Like you've built them up for the chorus.
  119. And then when the chorus comes, it's like the drop.
  120. On a roller coaster, people put their hands up and you go down the ride nice and
  121. fast, right? It's the adrenaline rush.
  122. And that's essentially what what like the chorus is.
  123. It's like that adrenaline rush.
  124. And so these are the things that I'm listening for during the walk around test.
  125. All right. Try it out. I promise it's really gonna help you just get a clearer look
  126. from your track from beginning to end.
  127. It's a tiring process. I'm not saying it's easy, but let's say I'm working on a beat
  128. on a beat tape. And this is usually what I would do before it's complete, right?
  129. I would listen to each track one after another.
  130. And if I'm happy with each track, you know, generally, then it's good to go.
  131. All right. So that's it. That's this episode.
  132. That is the walk around test. If you would like to learn more about it, it's
  133. actually key number five in my book called Five Keys to a Successful Beat.
  134. It's totally free, and you can download it by going to it's gratuitous.com forward
  135. slash five keys. Again, just check the episode's description to see the link.
  136. If you guys would like to learn FL Studio, you guys should visit the website, it's
  137. gratuitous.com. I just released a video about being a recognized FL Studio trainer.
  138. FL Studio just came out with a new logo.
  139. it's about being a recognized trainer.
  140. So now everyone can use this, and I'm super super grateful and honored to be able to
  141. use that logo, the recognized trainer FL Studio logo.
  142. I will also link that video in into this podcast episode.
  143. So you'll actually have to visit the website.
  144. So on my website, find this podcast episode, which is season two, episode 19, and
  145. you guys will get a nice personal video from me talking about how I'm an FL Studio
  146. trainer and how I can help you guys learn to make beats, right?
  147. There's 27 courses in the platform now.
  148. I also have some books and tons of stuff like that.
  149. So if you ever have questions, you always feel free to reach out to me.
  150. And I'm always here on the background, always preparing for something for some beat
  151. making education for you guys.
  152. So thanks for listening, and I'll talk to you in the next
  153. one.
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